Taking a stand: On one knee with Colin Kaepernick

Colin Kaepernick (center) kneeled during the playing of the national
anthem before the San Francisco 49ers' preseason game at San Diego.

San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick broke no NFL rules for refusing to stand during the playing of the national anthem before each of his team's recent pre-season games. While pro football players are encouraged to stand, they are not required. 

In a recent interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, Kaepernick said: "When there's significant change and I feel like that flag represents what it's supposed to represent, this country is representing people the way that it's supposed to, I'll stand."

During the 49ers' final pre-season game last Thursday at San Diego, Kaepernick and teammate Eric Reed were observed side by side on one knee during the national anthem. The quarterback said he chose to kneel rather than sit "to show more respect for the men and women for fight for the country."

Kaepernick's actions have been criticized by many as being disrespectful to the United States. "Once again, I'm not anti-American," Kaepernick said last Thursday. "I love America. I love people. That's why I am doing this. I want to help make America better. I think having these conversations helps everybody have a better understanding of where everybody is coming from."

Recently, Kaepernick sat down for a lengthy, 18-minute interview with reporters that allowed the embattled athlete a chance to explain his thinking on the matter, which has been the subject of much discussion in both the news and sports sections of major newspapers across the country, on cable news channels, as well as countless hours devoted to the topic on sports talk radio.

http://www.sfgate.com/49ers/article/49ers-Colin-Kaepernick-transcript-I-ll-9189548.php

Kaepernick will start the 2016 season as his team's second-string quarterback, which he would have been regardless of his recent political activism. He is recovering from an extensive injury which sidelined him for much of last season. If he loses his job and is cut by the 49ers, it will be because of his playing merits not his personal decision to not stand during the national anthem. He has publicly said that the reason for sitting (or in the case of last week taking a knee) through the anthem is a show of protest against racial inequality. 

According to Kaepernick, who is biracial and was adopted by white parents, he said he would not honor a song "nor show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color."

Last week, former NBA great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar wrote an insightful opinion piece that was published in the Washington Post in which he suggested that insulting Kaepernick says more about our patriotism than his. He suggests we should let athletes love their country in their own ways.

"The discussion of the nuances of patriotism is especially important right now, with Trump and Clinton supporters each righteously claiming ownership of the 'most patriotic' label," wrote Abdul-Jabbar. "Patriotism isn't just getting teary-eyed on the Fourth of July or choked up at war memorials. It's supporting what the Fourth of July celebrates and what those war memorials commemorate: the U.S. Constitution's insistence that all people should have the same rights and opportunities and that it is the obligation of the government to make that happen. When the government fails in those obligations, it is the responsibility of patriots to speak up and remind them of their duty."

On Sunday, U.S. international soccer star and Seattle Reign midfielder Megan Rapinoe knelt during the national anthem before her team's match against the Chicago Red Stars in a show of solidarity for Kaepernick. Afterwards, she said her action "was very intentional," and said she plans to continue kneeling before the anthem for the rest of the season.

Rapinoe told American Soccer Now that her gesture was a "little nod to Kaepernick and everything he's standing for now.

"I think it's actually pretty disgusting the way he was treated and the way that a lot of the media has covered it and made it about something that it absolutely isn't. We need to have a more thoughtful, two-sided conversation about racial issues in this county."

Further, Rapinoe said: "Being a gay American, I know what it means to look at the flag and not have it protect all of your liberties. (The gesture) was something small that I could do and something that I plan to keep doing in the future and hopefully spark some meaningful conversation about it.

"It's important to have white people stand in support of people of color on this. We don't need to be the leading voice, of course, but standing in support of them is something that's really powerful."

Having the President's back is something that's really powerful, too. 

On Monday, speaking at a news conference in Hangzhou, China, where he's attending a meeting of Group of 20 countries, President Obama said the 49ers quarterback was "exercising his constitutional right" by refusing to stand during the national anthem. He cited a long history of sports figures who have made political statements. 

"I think he cares about some real, legitimate issues that have to be talked about," said President Obama. "And if nothing else, what he's done is he's generated more conversation around some topics that need to be talked about.

"There are a lot of ways you can do it. As a general matter, when it comes to the flag and the national anthem and the meaning that that holds for our men and women in uniform and those who fought for us – that is a tough thing for them to get past to then hear what his deeper concerns are."

I support Colin Kaepernick's right to protest. I respect a person's ability to act according to their conscience. Looking back, Rosa Parks sat down on a public bus to protest discrimination, and Gandhi walked across India in protest of discrimination. So, why not Kaepernick sitting down during the national anthem in protest of discrimination? After all, when did a non-violent, non-disruptive, non-coercive personal protest against injustice in the United States suddenly become un-American?

Photo: Courtesy of Google Images.

Mississippi memo: You don't love your neighbor by discriminating against them

Mississippi / From Hospitality State to Hostility State, thanks to H.B. 1523.

Dear Mississippi,

In case you missed it we've already had this conversation. You don't get to decide who sits at the lunch counter.

Love, America

The above letter that's making the rounds on Facebook sums up a lot of common-sense feelings in just a few words. In a matter of days, Mississippi went from being the "Hospitality State" to the "Hostility State," thanks to the recent passing of a hateful and discriminatory measure (House Bill 1523) by the State Legislature.

Memo to Republican Governor Phil Bryant: "You don't love your neighbors by discriminating against them." Shame on you.

Mississippi / "You're on my mind ... "

Indeed, I've been saddened by the appalling news that my former home state of Mississippi (where I graduated from high school in the Gulf Coast city of Ocean Springs) last week passed legislation and the governor signed into law "The Religious Liberty Accommodations Act," which directly targets the LGBT community throughout the state – from Tupelo to Biloxi, from the Delta to the Gulf Coast and everywhere in between.  The bill is so draconian that the state's largest daily newspaper, the Clarion-Ledger of Jackson called it "an act of oppression."

According to the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the nation's largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) civil rights organization, H.B. 1523 "would allow individuals, religious organizations and private associations to use religion to discriminate against LGBT Mississippians in some of the most important aspects of their lives, including at work, at schools, and in their communities."

In an April 6 editorial, The Clarion-Ledger wrote: "Through the swish of  pen, (Governor Phil) Bryant signed away the rights of families, ignored the pleas of residents and businesses, and wrote another page in the state's history that future generations will be shocked – even embarrassed – to read. With a final stroke of that pen, Mississippi welcomed its latest Jim Crow law and displayed a sign for the world to see: Welcome to Mississippi. No gays allowed. Mississippi and its citizens deserve better than this unconscionable law."

In no time at all, Mississippi became the butt of jokes nationwide, as evidenced by a satirical Mississippi Anti-LGBT video released by the comedy website Funny or Die, which has already received 50,000 views on YouTube:

According to an article in the South Mississippi Sun-Herald newspaper over the weekend, Gulf Coast mayors seemed unanimous in their stance against H.B. 1523, saying it didn't reflect the residents of their respective South Mississippi cities. Each worries about the negative publicity and potential economic fallout that might hit the Coast. (On Monday, rock singer Bryan Adams pulled out of a concert scheduled for Thursday in Biloxi to protest the signing of H.B. 1523.)

Ocean Springs Mayor Connie Moran told the Sun-Herald she thought H.B. 1523 was unnecessary and bad legislation. "It is nothing more than codified discrimination," she said. "This just set us back to the 1960s. We're just moving from a sense of bigotry from race to sexual identity.

"Freedom of religious expression is every individual's right, but it has no place in government."

Memo to the Mississippi State Legislature and other supporters of H.B. 1523:  Folks, it's 2016 not 1966! Have you not learned from your past?

Fortunately, there's at least one voice of reason in Mississippi, despite all of the shambles happening at the state capitol. It belongs to independent bookseller Square Books, located on the town square in Oxford, the city which is home to the University of Mississippi. In business since 1979 – and widely known among readers as the hub of William Faulkner's "postage stamp of native soil," Yoknapatawpha – Square Books in its infancy hosted a variety of racially and culturally diverse authors including Toni Morrison, Allen Ginsberg and Alice Walker as well as Mississippians John Grisham, Richard Ford and Willie Morris.

Over the weekend on their Facebook page, the owners of Square Books posted a message that read: "In the wake of HB-1523, we at Square Books want to make sure you know that you are welcome here. Always. 'If you are anyone, from anywhere, we hope you will visit us, and we hope you may find something you would like to read.'"

Square Books gets it – that H.B. 1523 needs to be repealed. Now, let's hope that the state's governor and legislature get it, too. Sooner than later.

As Rev. Susan Russell, an Episcopal priest and activist from Pasadena, Calif., recently wrote on Huffington Post, "Let's get back to work making this a country where the pledge of 'liberty and justice for all' doesn't depend on your zip code. It's what we're all called to do."

Amen.